Coming Season

Hee Haw, the corny country music-comedy show that's one of the longest-running programs in TV history, will suspend full production for next season and air reruns.The syndicated show should resume production next year for the 1994 season, officials said.The coming season - the show's 25th - will include one new episode, a two-hour anniversary special. The other shows will be reruns, titled Hee Haw Silver.The show was overhauled this year in an attempt to upgrade its hayseed image. Performers quit wearing overalls and straw hats, and some of its stars, including Cathy Baker, Misty Rowe and Marianne Rogers, were replaced by younger entertainers.

One of the most recognizable players on the Orlando City Soccer Club is moving on. Midfielder Jamie Watson, who helped the Lions to two USL Pro titles in the past three seasons, has reached terms on a multiyear contract with Minnesota United F.C. of the North American Soccer League. "It's a great opportunity," Orlando City coach Adrian Heath said. "I couldn't give him the kind of assurance that he is looking for on playing time in the coming season. It's a sad day, but it's one of those decisions that has been made for all the right reasons.

Melrose Place star Grant Show reports that the Fox network and his producers ''are talking about doing 35 episodes'' in the coming season.''That's two hours more than we did this past season, and we're starting production later in the summer. Physically, I don't know if it's possible to do 35,'' he said. ''On the other hand, knowing (producer) Aaron Spelling, I'm sure he'll come up with a way if he wants to.''

More than 1,400 emergency managers, government officials and others whose job is reacting to tropical disasters have converged on Orlando this week for the National Hurricane Conference to prepare for what many here fear could be a devastating storm season. Hailing from Florida and other hurricane-vulnerable states from Rhode Island to Texas, they will attend hours of workshops and lectures on preparedness, storm dangers and recovery operations so they can be on top of their game when the Atlantic hurricane season starts June 1. Experts say the Atlantic basin remains in an era of heightened intensity, characterized by abnormally warm ocean temperatures.

So why did X-Files creator Chris Carter reveal that May's season finale - FBI Agent Mulder (David Duchovny) apparently shooting himself to death - was a hoax?''Usually I wouldn't do that, but because there was going to be a lot of attention on The X-Files movie, and I would be asked how he could do the movie, it was my way of indirectly answering that question,'' Carter said last week.''Everyone kind of knows he isn't dead. I don't think I was really telling anybody anything they hadn't suspected.

Don Baylor, the veteran slugger with 331 homers in his big league career, signed a 1-year contract with the Oakland Athletics on Tuesday and said the team's main selling point was the promise of at least 300 at-bats in the coming season. At least three other clubs were interested in Baylor, 38, and one of them, the Kansas City Royals, made an offer that included a front- office job after he ended his playing days. Baylor, who spent one season (1976) with Oakland early in his career, has been on American League pennant winners the last two seasons, Boston in 1986 and Minnesota last year.

Michael Rapaport, who fought The War at Home on Fox the past two seasons, is moving over to serve some time on My Name Is Earl. Rapaport will have a recurring part on the NBC series in the coming season, playing an inmate in the jail where Earl (Jason Lee) is serving time. He's also signed a development deal with 20th Century Fox TV, which produces the show. "He is a TV star. He is one of the few guys out there that can carry a show," Sharon Klein, senior VP of casting at 20th TV, tells The Hollywood Reporter.

What all three companies are interested in is finding affordable ways to keep their own homes -- or, in the case of Orlando Theatre Project, finding affordable spaces they can rent from time to time. Run as a professional theater-artists' cooperative, OTP never has been flush. But when it left its rent-free home at Seminole Community College in 2005, times got harder. The Seminole County audience didn't follow the company to Loch Haven Park, where OTP rented space at Orlando Repertory Theatre and the Lowndes Shakespeare Center.

I APPLAUD Mr. DeVos for not getting into a prolonged bidding war for Shaquille O'Neal. True, the Magic will miss his presence, but they did OK without him a few times last season.The important thing is what to do about his absence. Your paper has speculated about various trades involving Dennis Scott, Nick Anderson and even Penny Hardaway. But these people, plus Horace Grant, constitute the real guts of the team. They are the ones who set up Shaq's plays, got the most rebounds, made the most steals, forced the most turnovers and made the most free throws.

One of the most recognizable players on the Orlando City Soccer Club is moving on. Midfielder Jamie Watson, who helped the Lions to two USL Pro titles in the past three seasons, has reached terms on a multiyear contract with Minnesota United F.C. of the North American Soccer League. "It's a great opportunity," Orlando City coach Adrian Heath said. "I couldn't give him the kind of assurance that he is looking for on playing time in the coming season. It's a sad day, but it's one of those decisions that has been made for all the right reasons.

What all three companies are interested in is finding affordable ways to keep their own homes -- or, in the case of Orlando Theatre Project, finding affordable spaces they can rent from time to time. Run as a professional theater-artists' cooperative, OTP never has been flush. But when it left its rent-free home at Seminole Community College in 2005, times got harder. The Seminole County audience didn't follow the company to Loch Haven Park, where OTP rented space at Orlando Repertory Theatre and the Lowndes Shakespeare Center.

Michael Rapaport, who fought The War at Home on Fox the past two seasons, is moving over to serve some time on My Name Is Earl. Rapaport will have a recurring part on the NBC series in the coming season, playing an inmate in the jail where Earl (Jason Lee) is serving time. He's also signed a development deal with 20th Century Fox TV, which produces the show. "He is a TV star. He is one of the few guys out there that can carry a show," Sharon Klein, senior VP of casting at 20th TV, tells The Hollywood Reporter.

The first football Saturday of 2006 is a little less than two months away, but with an ever-growing swell of preseason magazines already on bookshelves, fans have plenty to debate during the dog days of summer. In the fall, names such as Bowden, Meyer, Paterno and Stoops are the focal points of fan debate. But from the time the first preseason publications hit the shelves in May until kickoff in September, names such as Sporting News, Street & Smith's and Lindy's are ample substitutes of fan envy and ire. For people like Phil Steele, who says he writes every article in the 300-page-plus Phil Steele's National College Preview, witnessing the football-magazine frenzy before each season never gets old. "My wife would not object to the word `obsession' being used to describe what I do," says Steele, 46. He said he spends an estimated 100 hours a week researching and compiling the information that goes into his publication.

National college basketball is coming back to Orlando -- for the holidays. Disney World and ESPN Regional are putting the final touches on an eight-team tournament to be held Thanksgiving weekend with the idea of growing the scope of it each year. The three-day event will be staged at the 5,500-seat Milk House at Disney's Wide World of Sports Complex. "It will happen. That's our pledge right now, that we're going to get this thing off the ground," said Clint Overby, senior director of events for ESPN Regional.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- The guy with the name NASCAR drivers love to say, Boris Said, was onstage in a hotel ballroom Monday, addressing 300 media people in the biggest press conference of his life, when his cell phone rang. And rang. And rang. He plucked it from his pocket, looked at the caller I.D., shrugged and let it keep ringing. Now his audience was cracking up en masse. Boris Said can do that to people. He returned to one of his bizarre philosophical observations: "There's 300 million people in America, and only 43 of them get to start a Nextel Cup race on a given Sunday, so the odds are pretty slim" -- and the cell phone rang again.

Grant Hill is looking for tickets to the NBA Finals next month, whetting his appetite for what he sees in his future. Tracy McGrady will start recruiting free agents immediately. General Manager John Gabriel left Wednesday for Phoenix with much of his staff to scout college talent. Darrell Armstrong, while soaking his battered body in a hot tub, said he might be better suited to become a spark-off-the-bench player again. Yes, things will change rapidly -- and dramatically -- this summer for the Orlando Magic.

GENERAL MANAGER Jerry Krause undoubtedly has his eye on Iowa State's Tim Floyd to coach the Bulls, but Phil Jackson's successor likely will be added as an assistant and then take over as head coach once there's a little more distance between himself and the fall of this dynasty.NEW JERSEY NETSAFTER SITTING down for breakfast with the new team owners, coach John Calipari vows he will not exercise an escape clause in his contract after the coming season - as long as the organization is moving forward.

The harder the sell, the weaker the product.That theory seems to apply to television series, and judging by the new fall crop, the broadcast networks have a lot of strenuous selling ahead.They'll try to put the most optimistic spin on the coming season at the TV critics' summer tour in Pasadena, Calif.The tour enters its main phase today as CBS presents its stars and executives to the nation's TV writers. NBC, ABC and Fox will follow over the next two weeks.The tour allows critics to learn about network strategies, stars' hopes and the direction series might take.

For the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Miami Dolphins and Jacksonville Jaguars, the road to New Orleans for Super Bowl XXXVI encompasses at least one night with Dennis Miller. Florida's three NFL clubs each were granted a prime-time date on Monday Night Football when the league released its schedule Thursday. The Bucs open the season at Dallas, their first trip to Texas in 11 seasons, and have a nationally televised home game with Green Bay on Oct. 7. Tampa Bay's home-opener is a rematch of the last year's NFC Wild Card game with Philadelphia.

Financially strapped Civic Theatre of Central Florida wants to bow out of the business of presenting live theater by donating its building in a merger with the University of Central Florida. The university wants to accept the generous gift. But there's a catch to this curtain call. "The problem is that we cannot accept or acquire a building that the Legislature has not approved if we have any expectation of having the state pay for maintenance," said Bill Merck, vice president of administration and finance at UCF. "The Legislature has to approve this acquisition."